Just ignore Farage, Johnson tells Tories
Speaking to the Swiss magazine Weltwoche, the former prime minister pointed out that when he was leading the Conservatives, the Brexit Party – which changed its name to Reform UK in 2021 – was at 'zero per cent' in the polls.
Some MPs have called for the former prime minister to return to the Commons to revive the fortunes of the Conservative Party, which is now being beaten in the polls by Reform.
Mr Johnson said that while he felt 'a deep sense of regret' that he was 'not able to be useful', he could afford to return to politics because he had to pay for his wife Carrie's new kitchen.
However, he did offer advice on how to tackle the threat from Reform, saying that the best thing was for political rivals to offer their own policies and not to talk about Mr Farage.
'My strategy with the individuals that you mention is don't talk about them,' he said.
'When I was running the UK, this party you mention was on zero per cent in the polls, sometimes 3 per cent max. Don't talk about them. Talk about what you are going to offer the people.'
The Brexit Party was on 19 per cent in the polls when Mr Johnson took over as prime minister in July 2019. By the general election in December, that had fallen to 2 per cent.
Mr Johnson was speaking a year on from the general election, at which Reform secured five seats with 14.3 per cent of the vote and the Tories lost 252 seats, recording a 23.2 per cent vote share.
The most recent survey of voting intention by YouGov has Reform on 26 per cent, Labour on 24 per cent, and the Conservatives on 17 per cent.
In the May local elections, Reform wiped out Conservative councils across England in an historic sweep. Mr Farage's party won control of seven local authorities and became the largest party in three others.
Both Sir Keir Starmer and Kemi Badenoch, the Tory leader, have been accused of spending too much time addressing the threat from Reform.
In March, in an interview with The Telegraph, Mrs Badenoch dismissed Mr Farage as a reality TV star, saying government was not an episode of I'm a Celebrity.
Mr Farage retorted that it was a good thing that people know who he was, and compared his television past with that of Donald Trump.
In May, Sir Keir gave a speech dedicated to attacking Reform. The Prime Minister declared the Right-wing party his main opposition, and said that the Conservatives had 'run out of road'.
His efforts to tackle Reform have backfired, however. He echoed the party's hard-line stance on migration in a speech last month, when he said that Britain was at risk of becoming an 'island of strangers', but it was met with fury from Labour MPs and he later said he regretted using the phrase.
I'm trying to pay for Carrie's kitchen
Mr Johnson said he was sorry that he was 'not able to be useful' to the Conservative Party.
'I feel a deep sense of regret that I'm not able to be useful today,' he said.
Asked whether he would consider returning to power – as Cincincattus later did in Rome – he implied that he could not afford to.
'Rome is in good hands and I'm very happy,' he said. 'I'm engaged in the innocent task of trying to pay for my wife's kitchen refurbishment which is extremely expensive and difficult and that's basically what I'm doing.'
While in office Mr Johnson is said to have privately complained about the cost of refurbishing the Downing Street flat he shared with his wife.
A row over who funded the redecoration, which came to more than £100,000 with thousands spent on luxury wallpaper, fuelled a backlash among Tory MPs.
Elsewhere in the interview, Mr Johnson also took aim at Sir Keir's non-dom crackdown and suggested it would be 'useful' for the Government to leave the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
He criticised Sir Keir's high-tax policies, especially the raid on non-doms which had driven billionaires out of London.
Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor, is now considering reversing the policy under which non-doms are charged 40 per cent inheritance tax on their global assets.
'Every private business in Britain, a big increase in taxes, big taxes on non-doms,' Mr Johnson said. 'My God: people are leaving London to come to Italy. What's going on? Mamma mia.'
Calling the exodus 'unbelievable', he said that he had met people leaving London for Italy.
'When I was mayor of London I used to say that London was to the billionaire as the jungles of Sumatra are to the orangutan,' he said. 'You went out into Mayfair late at night and you saw the billionaires in their natural habitat, and now I think you can come to Italy for a flat tax of €200,000 – it's a good deal.
'I met some people last night who had fled London to come to Italy. When I was running London that would have been absolutely unthinkable.'
He also suggested that leaving the ECHR could be a 'useful' way to bring down illegal immigration.
A Conservative policy to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda was blocked by European judges citing the ECHR in 2022.
Mr Johnson said: 'It would be useful to quit the ECHR but the main thing is to get back to our Rwanda plan: the only credible way of smashing the cross-Channel gangs. Bring back Rwanda.'
Mrs Badenoch last month signalled she was ready to quit the ECHR 'in the national interest'. She has set up a commission to look at the possibility of leaving the treaty, amid concerns it makes it harder for countries to expel illegal migrants.
The UK's membership of the ECHR is a divisive issue, with Reform committed to leaving and Labour to remaining.
'Boris-wave' of migration is 'nonsense'
Mr Johnson also discussed immigration and rejected criticism that he oversaw a 'Boris-wave' of migrants flooding into the UK.
Mr Johnson blamed the huge increase on civil servants for over-estimating the number of EU nationals who were going to leave after Brexit, meaning they allowed too many others to come in to replace them to do vital jobs.
'Nonsense. All bollocks,' he said. 'What we had was two things: we had Covid which meant nobody came, so immigration collapsed, and then what happened was unfortunately the Remain Establishment believed their own propaganda.
'They thought the millions of EU nationals were all leaving and they were not… They panicked when we couldn't find people to stack the shelves and drive the trucks after Covid but the crucial thing is that we took back full legal control and can rectify such mistakes immediately while Starmer would surrender control again to the EU.'
A European Union research document last week claimed Brexit was the main driver of Britain's worsening migration crisis, stating that the post-Brexit 'liberalisation of migration laws' caused a record increase in net migration.
But Mr Johnson defended Brexit, saying it saved lives during the Covid pandemic because it meant the nation was able to roll out vaccines quickly.
'Brexit was a wonderful thing and is a wonderful thing and I love Brexit more and more with a weird intensity because it's about freedom and autonomy is the most wonderful thing for people, for countries, for families,' he said.
'We saved lives because of Brexit and we were able to get our economy moving again faster because of Brexit.'
Mr Johnson also addressed the conflict in the Middle East, downplaying the suggestion of imminent regime change in Iran.
'I've become a bit of a sceptic about the value of regime change in the Middle East,' he said.
'Countries need to make their own decisions about their governments. You can't impose a new government. We tried it in Iraq, we tried it in Libya, it wasn't a great success…
'I may be wrong but I don't think there will be regime change very soon in Tehran. That's not the information I'm getting.'
A Reform source said: 'Boris Johnson did unprecedented damage to this country. He is the mastermind behind the mass immigration experiment.
'Whilst he tries to save and rewrite his legacy of mass immigration and net zero, Reform is offering the country real change.'
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
Reform UK puts teenagers in charge of vital public services
Reform UK's local election wins have led to teenagers being put in charge of vital public services, including a 19-year-old who is overseeing children and family services while at university. Two months after the elections in which Nigel Farage's party took overall control of 10 councils, concerns have been raised about the experience of candidates who have been appointed to roles with wide-ranging responsibility. At Leicestershire county council, the Reform councillor Charles Pugsley, 19, has been made the cabinet member for children and family services. Pugsley's elevation has caused particular concern, as has that of Joseph Boam, a 22-year-old who has been made the deputy council leader and handed the adult social care portfolio, despite having previously expressed the view that 'depression isn't real'. Both are defenders of a Reform policy that would block the council from flying community emblems such as the Pride and disabled people's flags over council property. More than 100 social workers and other employees at the council have signed a letter condemning the policy, which they allege 'promotes exclusion and marginalisation'. According to the anti-extremism campaign group Hope Not Hate, a now deleted social media account appearing to belong to Boam had frequently retweeted and posted apparent praise for the misogynistic influencer Andrew Tate. Another claim on the same account that 'depression isn't real' raised concern among fellow councillors who have written to Reform's leader at Leicestershire. Boam has reportedly dismissed the allegation as 'fake news'. News of their appointments follow that of George Finch, 18, who has become the interim leader of the neighbouring Warwickshire county council a year after completing his A-levels. Their relative lack of experience has caused unease across the political divide. Deborah Taylor, a Conservative councillor and leader of the opposition who was the previous cabinet member for children and families in Leicestershire, questioned their qualifications to hold roles overseeing services that account for more than 70% of the council's £616m budget. 'I am a huge champion of young people and young councillors but what really concerns me is that new young councillors should be nurtured rather than being thrown in at the deep end to what can be a quite full-on role where there is exposure to some real trauma and difficult decisions,' she said. 'Rather than age, it's about political and life experience, whether that's as someone who has worked or even as a parent with knowledge of household pressures.' The concerns were echoed by social workers at the council. 'There is some confidence that much of what is being delivered can't be changed because it is statutory and underpinned by legislation. But there are areas where resources are being allocated on a 'spend to save' basis, such as early interventions for families who may, for example, have had multiple removals of children,' said one. 'It's an area where that spending has really paid off and there would be great concern about that being tinkered with or even cut.' Julia Ross, the chair of the British Association of Social Workers, said: 'Lead members for children's and adults' social services in local authorities are very important roles that carry the responsibility of handling hundreds of millions of pounds. Sign up to Headlines UK Get the day's headlines and highlights emailed direct to you every morning after newsletter promotion 'While we recognise and value the fresh perspectives that youth often brings, ideally, candidates should have experience in administrating such complex departments, as well as a working knowledge of their statutory duty to support what are often the most vulnerable people in our society.' Pugsley and Boam have come into their roles as Reform has pledged to deliver Elon Musk-style efficiency savings at councils even though many services have been cut to the bone over recent years. Neither responded to requests to comment although they have used their X accounts to answer critics. 'Some say I'm young. I say that's exactly what this role needs. I understand the challenges young people face today because I've been there. Now I'm making sure young voices are heard,' Pugsley tweeted. But this was questioned. Naomi Bottomley, a Green councillor, said: 'I know that Charles Pugsley has alluded to the idea that he knows more about what children need because he is young. But he also went to a private school and is a landlord, so I'm not sure he has quite the same experience as many vulnerable young people.' Pugsley, a computer science student at Nottingham University, is registered at Companies House as a director of two companies that list their business as the letting or operating of real estate. He and Boam, along with Finch in Warwickshire, also reflect a drive by Farage to leverage support among gen Z voters, with the party's popularity surging among 18- to 24-year-old men. Preet Gill, a Birmingham Labour MP who has voiced concern about Finch's role as leader at Warwickshire, said the appointments indicated how Reform would approach government. 'It's a carbon copy of the way in which Farage operates. They have made a lot of noise from performance politics and from being disruptive, rather than actually saying or doing anything of substance when it comes to delivery, or knowing how to deliver adult social care or children's services.'
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
Bob Vylan's vile anti-British rants - cheered on by the smug, middle-class Glastonbury wokerati - have brought the true ideology of the far Left into the open: CHARLIE DOWNES
By now, you will certainly have heard of Pascal Robinson-Foster, although you might know him better by his stage name, Bobby Vylan. A punk singer and political extremist who despises Britain, Robinson-Foster made headlines around the world last weekend when he called for 'death to the IDF' (Israeli Defence Forces) while performing at Glastonbury.
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
Trustee who used sermon to say Muslims would 'kill Jews' six days after October 7 attacks is disqualified - as Islamic charity is handed formal warning
An Islamic charity trustee who used a sermon to say Muslims would 'kill Jews' six days after Hamas 's October 7 attacks has been disqualified - with the charity also receiving a formal warning. Harun Abdur Rashid Holmes delivered the talk at Nottingham Islam Information Point where attendees heard 'the hour will not begin until the Muslims fight the Jews and the Muslims will kill them until a Jew hides behind a rock or a tree'. Guests at the event held by the charity, which is said to help victims of Islamophobia and teach about the religion, were also told not to 'busy yourselves with politics and voting'. Such an 'inflammatory and divisive' sermon has now seen the Charity Commissioner hit Nottingham Islam Information Point with a formal warning. The regulator, which operates across England and Wales, said this is one of more than 300 cases involving charities in the past 18 months related to conflict in the Middle East. They said the sermon delivered by Mr Holmes 'did not further the charity's purposes, including to provide relief to those in need, and was not in the charity's best interests', therefore amounting to misconduct and/or mismanagement. Mr Holmes, who is not a trained imam, was deemed not to have acted in accordance with his duties as a trustee and was disqualified in July last year. This means he is now not allowed to hold any senior management position in a charity in England and Wales for three years - and he has been noted by the commission to lack the good judgement expected of a trustee. The watchdog said while it recognised some of the sermon's content had come from a specific hadith - from the Islamic prophet Mohammed - the appropriate context had not been given and it therefore was 'inflammatory and divisive'. The regulator also said 'no consideration' had been given to the timing of the sermon, coming six days after the October 7 Hamas attacks in Israel, which Mr Holmes later accepted. The commission's assistant director of investigations and compliance, Stephen Roake, said: 'In times of conflict, people expect charities to bring people together, not to stoke division. In this case, we found due consideration had not been given to the words and rhetoric used. 'The sermon was inflammatory and divisive, and we acted robustly and disqualified the trustee who gave the sermon. We also issued the charity with a formal warning. 'Following our intervention, the charity's remaining trustees have taken positive steps to improve their governance. This includes the introduction of a more robust events policy. All charities that host events and speakers should take note of this case and ensure they have sufficient due diligence in place.' MailOnline has approached Nottingham Islam Information Point for comment. Charity Commission chief executive David Holdsworth said such instances were 'undermining' charity's 'potential for good' in an opinion piece for the Sunday Telegraph. He wrote: 'Over the past few years, and particularly since the escalation of conflict in the Middle East in October 2023, we have seen charities misused to promote the personal views of those linked to the charity, in some cases inciting hate, or condoning violence. 'While trustees, like all of us, have personal rights to freedom of speech, there can be no hiding place for those who seek to use charities to promote hate or harm to others. 'This is not only to put a stop to fundamentally uncharitable activity, but also to help protect and promote public trust in the wider charitable sector.' Mr Holdsworth added that he will 'not shy away' from using 'more robust powers' to stop those 'undermining the incredible positive impact of charities at home and abroad'. Of the 300 cases considered since the end of 2023 in relation to conflict in the Middle East, around a third have resulted in formal statutory guidance being issued by the commission. More than 70 referrals to police have been made where the regulator considered that a criminal offence might have been committed. In January, a London charity was handed an official warning after fundraising for a soldier in the Israel Defence Forces. The Chabad Lubavitch Centres North East London and Essex Ltd, which describes itself as working for the advancement of the Orthodox Jewish religion, raised more than £2,000 after setting up an online page in October 2023 for a soldier stationed in northern Israel. Some £937 was sent directly to an individual soldier but the commission said the trustees of the charity were unable to account for how the money was spent and the regulator concluded the charity's actions had amounted to misconduct and a breach of trust. While charities in England and Wales can legally raise funds to support the UK armed forces, they cannot legally provide aid or military supplies to any foreign armed force, the commission said. It was believed to be the first time the regulator had used its powers to issue an official warning on the issue of fundraising for a foreign military. The case was not one among those referred to police, as the commission said its unlawfulness related to charity law rather than criminal law.
